


Zombie Apocalypse AU

by callboxkat



Category: Sanders Sides, Sanders Sides (Web Series), Thomas Sanders
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Zombies, Cafe Owner Remy, Gen, Healer Patton, M/M, Post-Apocalypse, Scientist Logic | Logan Sanders, Zombie Apocalypse, if you want details on character death scroll to the notes at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 16:47:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21651529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callboxkat/pseuds/callboxkat
Summary: A few decades after the start of the zombie apocalypse, it has been discovered that there are rare cases of resistance to the virus. Logan Sanders, a researcher, hopes to use them to save humanity.
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders & Morality | Patton Sanders, Creativitwins - Relationship, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders & Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders & Logic | Logan Sanders, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders & Sleep | Remy Sanders, Dr. Emile Picani/Sleep | Remy Sanders, Remile
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	Zombie Apocalypse AU

The story takes place a couple of decades after the beginning of the apocalypse.

Most of the world’s population has been lost, and much of what is left lives together in settlements, walled off from the zombie-overrun outside. Very few people try to make it on their own in the wastelands.

Even after so long, accidents continue to happen, and sometimes the undead will infect a settlement, whether due to failing barriers, carelessness, or deception on the part of someone who had ventured outside and was bitten.

That is exactly what happens to Solaris, a once prosperous settlement with a population of over 1000 residents. No one knows exactly what happened, but within the span of a few hours, the settlement is reduced to utter chaos.

About a hundred make it out alive.

One thing that people have found out after the infection being around for so long is that a very, very small percentage of the population is immune. Or, at least, less affected by the virus. It’s very rare, and there is no known way to determine whether or not someone is immune unless they are infected and survive.

As it turns out, among the survivors of Solaris are three such people. They include a mysterious man simply known as Deceit, a darkly dressed recluse named Virgil, and one half of a set of twins, a guard in training named Remus. These three survivors are evacuated to a settlement called Haven.

Haven is home to one of the few research centers of this world where scientists work to study the contagion, its origins, its effects, and especially, possible cures. Therefore, those with some level of immunity are highly valuable for research.

Logan Sanders is one of the most highly respected researchers of Haven. He dislikes the term “immunity” often used to refer to those who survive the infection. He prefers “resistance”. 

This is, of course, because those who are resistant to the zombie virus are rarely left unchanged.

Logan is especially intrigued by Remus, who is one half of a set of identical twins. His brother Roman, who also survived Solaris, is transferred to the settlement along with him. Logan is interested in finding out what detectable changes the virus may have caused in Remus, and how these changes might be more easily found with a twin to compare him to. He also wants to try to find out if Roman is also resistant.

Another resident of Haven is Patton, a healer who helps the refugees from Solaris settle in and is one of the few who is willing to approach the survivors of the contagion. He especially takes a liking to Virgil, and he also befriends Roman, serving as a comfort to him as he struggles with the idea that his brother may never be who he once was.

Because, as stated above, even those who survive the zombie virus are not completely immune. They are all affected, although in different ways.

For Virgil, this simply means that he has sunken-in, shadowed eyes, a gravelly voice, and a tendency towards anxiousness and irritability that is only slightly exacerbated by the virus and by the social strains of his new status. He often has stiff joints in the mornings, but it usually improves as the day goes on. He was bitten twice, once on the arm and once on the shoulder. He always wears long sleeves to hide the scars, which are very visible even after he heals.

For Deceit, the effects of the virus are more severe. He has trouble remembering words sometimes, and he often says the opposite of what he actually means as a result. By the time he reaches Haven, one half of his face (he was bitten on the cheek) has adopted the corpse-like, scaly gray appearance of a zombie, as does the skin of his neck, arm, and hand on that side. The eye on the affected half of his face also takes on the milky white appearance that those of a zombie often do. He shuffles when he walks, but isn’t in pain. People had actually begun to fear that his resistance may have only delayed the onset of the infection, not stopped it altogether; and he was quarantined; but by the time of his arrival at the new settlement it is clear that his symptoms have finished progressing. He takes to wearing gloves to hide his hands, and to using his hair and a hat to help obscure the damage to his face.

As for Remus, the effects are less visible: for the most part, the virus affects his brain. He suffers from near-constant intrusive thoughts and impulses, like that a zombie might experience, although he is generally able to resist them. He is usually kept restrained for his own and others’ safety, especially at the beginning. His irises are paler than they used to be, a change that would not have been noticed if not for his identical twin’s presence, and some of his hair begins to gray. He was bitten on the leg, but he and Roman weren’t able to stop long enough to amputate it in time to avoid his infection.

Both to support Remus and to help with the possibility of finding a cure, Roman all but lives at the research center. When he does go out, though, he soon befriends a man named Remy, the owner of a cafe in the settlement’s downtown. Even post apocalyptic wastelands need caffeine, Remy says. Coffee is very expensive and hard to come by, but he makes a reliable living selling herbal teas and other drinks as well as food. Roman likes the cafe because Remy has an unusually extensive collection of books, including some fairy tales that Roman is quite fond of. 

Roman eventually opens up to Remy, telling him that he is the brother of one of the immune survivors from Solaris.

Remy doesn’t quite know how to feel about that at first. He can’t help but resent those few who are resistant to the virus, since he lost his boyfriend to the infection some years before. Most of the books in the cafe had once been his, in fact.

He grows more sympathetic as he gets to know Roman better and learns of the effects that the virus has had on his brother. He thinks that that might have been worse, in a way, to lose who someone close to him was in that way. As least Emile was himself, at least until the end.

Even after months go by, Roman holds out hope that the Remus he knew is still in there.

Meanwhile, at the research center, the researchers continue their studies.

Logan finds out from tests on blood samples that Roman is, in fact, resistant to the zombie virus. He is the first person known to be immune before infection due to the sheer rarity of the condition, and the previous implausibility of testing the blood of every citizen of Haven, let alone all settlements. Logan hopes to use the knowledge of how the virus affects his blood differently to help find more people with resistance to the virus, and to figure out how that resistance might be transferred to others. The fact that Roman is resistant like Remus shows that resistance may be hereditary.

Since Roman is the first uninfected, virus-resistant person to be found, the researchers have high hopes for how they may potentially use him to help others.

Of course, Roman wants to focus firstly on how they might help his brother. They try giving transfusions of Roman’s blood to Remus, and Remus actually begins to improve. Whether this is due to a boost in immunity from Roman’s uninfected blood or simply because Remus is adapting to his condition as time goes on, Logan is reluctant to say, but they keep doing the transfusions anyway. 

Logan won’t admit that part of the reason for this is how happy it makes Roman to be able to help his brother.

Eventually they begin to give transfusions to Deceit, as well, to find out if he will also show improvement. They can’t do the same with Virgil, as Roman’s blood isn’t a match for his.

To Logan’s genuine surprise, it does seem to help. The appearance of his face and hands doesn’t improve much, but he shuffles less, and has more success at remembering words. He still tends to speak in opposites, but given his nickname, that might be by choice.

The researchers continue to study the resistant survivors to better understand how the virus affects people, but more than anything, Logan and the other researchers hope to use Roman’s blood to create a vaccine and potentially a treatment for those who are infected but not turned. 

Roman isn’t exactly happy to be a pincushion, but he’ll do it. For his brother. For people like Remy, who have lost so much to the infection. For everyone who lives in fear that one day, their home will be overrun.

It’s the right thing to do.

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers:  
> The major character death refers to Emile, Remy's former boyfriend. He dies years before the start of the story and few details are given.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
